A conventional DC-DC converter receives a first DC voltage from a power supply and outputs a second DC voltage to a load circuit. There are generally two types of DC-DC converters: switching regulators and linear regulators. Switching regulators are more power efficient but require large external passive components (inductors and capacitors) and therefore not cost/size effective for mixed-signal SoC (Systems on Chips) applications that require multiple independent power supply domains for various circuits. Also, switching regulators are often noisy due to switching. Linear regulators, on the other hand, are more cost/size effective and less noisy, but are not power efficient.
Accordingly, what is desired are DC-DC converters that are approximately as cost/size effective and clean as linear regulators, but also more power efficient, like switching regulators.